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I copied this from a previous post I made in the General questions section.
Premise: Most Christians do not believe in or are silent on pre-existence of human souls. Souls come about at conception or sometime after this, but before actual birth. Then during it's life it is given an opportunity to know and believe in Jesus Christ as son of God, and based on this belief and perhaps a lesser extent, the acts of faith it performs because of this knowledge, then goes on upon it's death to be blessed with eternal life when its body is ressurected, or faces eternal damnation (or destruction based on your interpretation of scripture). Now there are various nuances on this with Catholics hedging their bets with purgatory and limbo and many evangelicals pushing for a tighter interpretation that we must be “born again” to achieve this salvation.My reaction to this is that not only is it illogical, it denies the laws of the universe, is filled with basic inequalities, and makes little sense if the creator is a God of love.
First, it to me, violates law, laws that God created and set in motion. Nothing in the universe goes from infinite to finite or from finite to infinite. How then can one finite existence then lead to an infinite, eternal, reward or punishment?
Second, if the stakes are so incredibly high for our one life, then God certainly loves some of us much more then others. One is born to loving Christian parents who teach them, love and nurture them, and surround them with others who believe likewise and encourage and help them stay on path. Another is born in a devout Muslim family and lives the same, but for his faith. Another is born unto a child soldier in Africa, is taught to kill from an early age and in turn is killed as a young man. While all may have an opportunity for salvation, don't try and tell me the chances are the same. Why would the odds be so stacked against some. If we are all loved and we all have just one life then it is clearly unfair.
Third, if a loving God created us and loved us would he throw us into a life that in essence becomes a test that ultimately condemns the vast majority of souls? Knowing that God is omniscient would he create a system that would lead to this? I feel that God blessed us with the capacity to be parents so we could understand at some basic level what God feels about us. Can any of us who are parents comtemplate eternally destroying or damning our own children. Punish them when unruly sure, but to punish or destroy them eternally, I don't think so. If that is human love just think how much greater is divine love.
Why would God create us in the first place? To set up a litmus test of faith to separate good and bad, weak and strong? Or perhaps he wanted children he could see grow and mature and learn to love him and each other, knowing that these children are individuals with varying strengths and weaknesses who will mature at different rates. Do we hold a 5 year old to the same standards as an older child or an adult? I can't help but think that an omnipotent loving God who would bother creating mankind would have a better system for dispensing of our souls then what most of us were taught in common Christian theology.
Quote (Cato @ July 01 2008,01:02) So when we have a human birth we don't have a Spirit? I think not. Resurrection of what our old earthly body, made perfect or near so I suppose. I can't buy that as it is illogical and inequitable. Eternity then rests upon a finite lifetime filled with circumstances beyond our control that skews salvation toward some and not others. The divine would not create such a flawed method. Life is fair if it's purposes are to learn and evolve, it is patently unfair if it is a discreet test of faith designed to separate the elect or saved from the rest.
Hi Cato,
I must say that I tend to agree with both you and Thomas Paine, who had very much the same reasoning.Why would God be so unfair as to reserve salvation for only the people who happened to be born under the right circumstances to be taught to believe wholeheartedly, and without doubt, in something that can not be proven?
Tim
Quote (TimothyVI @ July 01 2008,06:02) Quote (Cato @ July 01 2008,01:02) So when we have a human birth we don't have a Spirit? I think not. Resurrection of what our old earthly body, made perfect or near so I suppose. I can't buy that as it is illogical and inequitable. Eternity then rests upon a finite lifetime filled with circumstances beyond our control that skews salvation toward some and not others. The divine would not create such a flawed method. Life is fair if it's purposes are to learn and evolve, it is patently unfair if it is a discreet test of faith designed to separate the elect or saved from the rest.
Hi Cato,
I must say that I tend to agree with both you and Thomas Paine, who had very much the same reasoning.Why would God be so unfair as to reserve salvation for only the people who happened to be born under the right circumstances to be taught to believe wholeheartedly, and without doubt, in something that can not be proven?
Tim
Hi TmThis is exactly the reason I believe God created man as a free moral agent.
For if man has no power over his own will but in fact is a product of cause and effect and cannot help what decisions he makes. then how could there be a judgemnt where some would be punished in extreme judgment or torment and others not?
If man has no choice in the outcome of his destiny then how can man be responsible for sin?
Words like temptation, follow him, take up our cross, deny ourselves, submit to God, judged according to our works, repent, believe and be saved, trust in the Lord with all our hearts and lean not to our own understanding, walk in the Spirit, man shall give account for every idle word he shall speak, ETC, ETC.
They mean nothing if I cannot choose.
The words Yeshua said, “not my will but thine be done” means nothing if my will is controlled by him apart from choice.
He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God? Micah 6:8
That scripture means nothing if I am not free to obey it or not?
WJ
Quote (Not3in1 @ July 01 2008,07:18) The Value of the Sacrifice anyone? 
Hi MandyThe value of the sacrifice means nothing if Yeshua didnt lay down his life “Willingly” and not because he had no choice.
Yeshua could have called legions of Angels to his rescue but instead chose to die a horrible death for us. Love.
The value of the sacrifice means nothing to the man that by his own will rejects it and tramples it under his feet.
Quote (Not3in1 @ July 01 2008,07:18) The Value of the Sacrifice anyone?
Hi Mandy:Quote Jhn 15:13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. God Bless
Quote (TimothyVI @ July 01 2008,06:02) Quote (Cato @ July 01 2008,01:02) So when we have a human birth we don't have a Spirit? I think not. Resurrection of what our old earthly body, made perfect or near so I suppose. I can't buy that as it is illogical and inequitable. Eternity then rests upon a finite lifetime filled with circumstances beyond our control that skews salvation toward some and not others. The divine would not create such a flawed method. Life is fair if it's purposes are to learn and evolve, it is patently unfair if it is a discreet test of faith designed to separate the elect or saved from the rest.
Hi Cato,
I must say that I tend to agree with both you and Thomas Paine, who had very much the same reasoning.Why would God be so unfair as to reserve salvation for only the people who happened to be born under the right circumstances to be taught to believe wholeheartedly, and without doubt, in something that can not be proven?
Tim
SO wise
Eph.1:3-12. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who blesses us with every spiritual blessing among the celestials, in Christ,
4 according as He chooses us in Him before the disruption of the world, we to be holy and flawless in His sight,
5 in love designating us beforehand for the place of a son for Him through Christ Jesus; in accord with the delight of His will,
6 for the laud of the glory of His grace, which graces us in the Beloved:
7 in Whom we are having the deliverance through His blood, the forgiveness of offenses in accord with the riches of His grace,
8 which He lavishes on us; in all wisdom and prudence
9 making known to us the secret of His will (in accord with His delight, which He purposed in Him)
10 to have an administration of the complement of the eras, to head up all in the Christ — both that in the heavens and that on the earth —
11 in Him in Whom our lot was cast also, being designated beforehand according to the purpose of the One Who is operating all in accord with the counsel of His will,
12 that we should be for the laud of His glory, who are pre-expectant in the Christ.“Free Will?”
Blessings.
Hi CO,
Check the context.
Spoken not just to the many called but to the chosen few.Eph1
1Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, to the saints which are at Ephesus, and to the faithful in Christ Jesus:2Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Quote (dirtyknections @ June 20 2008,06:12) Quote (Not3in1 @ June 20 2008,04:57) Quote (dirtyknections @ June 20 2008,03:06) Quote (Not3in1 @ June 19 2008,17:04) Quote (Nick Hassan @ June 19 2008,14:42) Hi not3,
Your own death will be a temporary inconvenience too?
You will not be tortured or crucified though.
Perhaps.But there are those who have been tortured…..
There are two points of interest here as far as I can see; one, what did Jesus truly sacrifice? And two, if he was indeed aware of his past life and knew glory and exhaultation was in his future – what was the risk that you were talkint about? Thanks, Mandy
I think the question is not what did Jesus sacrifice..but what did His father sacrifice?don't think in terms of trinity..thats not what I am getting at
Think more on the lines of Abraham and Issac
I think your eyes will open a little more…mine sure did
DK,What in your opinion did Jesus truly sacrifice?
Jesus sacrificed his previous Glory…but to me the real question is what did GOD his father sacrifice…Remember…Jesus belongs to GOD…the ransom was instituted out of need by GOD…So that is the real question
Hi Dk:I don't believe in pre-existence, but as to the question: What did the God the Father sacrifice?
My understanding is that God tasted death for all of humanity in the person of Jesus Christ. Did God die literally? No, God is eternal and is a Spirit. The body of His Son was and is His body. God's own flesh and blood. The body is the Holy Temple of God.
Allowing His Only Begotten Son to suffer all of the evil that any man can do and to do it without sin is the only way that sin could be overcome, and is the only way that the sacrifice could be for every man including those who delivered Jesus to be crucified and those who literally crucified him.
God agonized through all of this because of the suffering of His Son, but allowed it for the reasons stated above.
Quote (942767 @ July 01 2008,15:53) Quote (dirtyknections @ June 20 2008,06:12) Quote (Not3in1 @ June 20 2008,04:57) Quote (dirtyknections @ June 20 2008,03:06) Quote (Not3in1 @ June 19 2008,17:04) Quote (Nick Hassan @ June 19 2008,14:42) Hi not3,
Your own death will be a temporary inconvenience too?
You will not be tortured or crucified though.
Perhaps.But there are those who have been tortured…..
There are two points of interest here as far as I can see; one, what did Jesus truly sacrifice? And two, if he was indeed aware of his past life and knew glory and exhaultation was in his future – what was the risk that you were talkint about? Thanks, Mandy
I think the question is not what did Jesus sacrifice..but what did His father sacrifice?don't think in terms of trinity..thats not what I am getting at
Think more on the lines of Abraham and Issac
I think your eyes will open a little more…mine sure did
DK,What in your opinion did Jesus truly sacrifice?
Jesus sacrificed his previous Glory…but to me the real question is what did GOD his father sacrifice…Remember…Jesus belongs to GOD…the ransom was instituted out of need by GOD…So that is the real question
Hi Dk:I don't believe in pre-existence, but as to the question: What did the God the Father sacrifice?
My understanding is that God tasted death for all of humanity in the person of Jesus Christ. Did God die literally? No, God is eternal and is a Spirit. The body of His Son was and is His body. God's own flesh and blood. The body is the Holy Temple of God.
Allowing His Only Begotten Son to suffer all of the evil that any man can do and to do it without sin is the only way that sin could be overcome, and is the only way that the sacrifice could be for every man including those who delivered Jesus to be crucified and those who literally crucified him.
God agonized through all of this because of the suffering of His Son, but allowed it for the reasons stated above.
I agree…Quote (Nick Hassan @ July 01 2008,15:49) Hi CO,
Check the context.
Spoken not just to the many called but to the chosen few.Eph1
1Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, to the saints which are at Ephesus, and to the faithful in Christ Jesus:2Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Nick.
Addressed to the Ephesians, but for all the nations. Even you read it Nick, is it not for you also?Blessings.
Hi GM,
That is for you to judge.
But what it does show is the unity of the body of Christ.
What Christ in Paul taught the members 2000 years ago equally apply to members now.
Of course those sacred teachings do not apply to those outside of the body of Christ then or now.
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